Night fell.
The courtyard was left with only the chirping of insects and the sound of the wind, with the occasional rustle of branches and leaves.
The manor had an early meal.
The dishes were nothing refined—a few wild mountain greens, a plate of pickled bamboo shoots, and a pot of chicken soup simmered until tender.
Of everything on the table, the soup showed the most thought.
A thin sheen of golden oil floated on the surface.
It was savory and delicious on the tongue, and the chicken had been stewed until it fell cleanly off the bone.
In a sect, such fare would hardly count for anything, but in a remote medicine manor like this, it was already a respectable spread to offer guests.
Zhou Huai came personally to ask whether the immortals needed anything else, his manner exceedingly deferential.
Xu Ning sat by the table, watching Zhou Huai’s retreating back.
Shen Yi, seated across from him, noticed his distracted expression and couldn’t help lowering her voice to remind him.
“Xu Ning.”
Xu Ning snapped back to attention.
“What is it?”
“That’s what I should be asking you.”
Shen Yi looked at him with puzzlement.
“You’ve been spacing out ever since we entered the manor.”
Xu Ning was silent for a moment.
“It’s just that this place feels a little strange.”
“Strange how?”
“I can’t quite say.”
Shen Yi blinked, but didn’t immediately tease him.
Xu Ning turned to look out the window instead.
A few lanterns hung along the corridor outside, their light falling across the herb-drying racks.
The freshly washed medicinal roots had already been collected, leaving only a trace of moisture on the edges of the bamboo sieves.
Night wind passed through the backyard, carrying the faint scent of herbs and the smell of earth dampened by evening dew.
Perfectly ordinary.
So ordinary that it couldn’t possibly be suspicious.
Shen Yi followed his gaze for a moment, then said thoughtfully, “When we entered the village this afternoon, I mentioned that this place gathers wind and holds water, with the mountain terrain embracing it very steadily.”
“Isn’t that a good thing?”
“For people who grow medicine, yes.”
Shen Yi set down her chopsticks.
“When the qi doesn’t disperse and the water doesn’t run off, the earth vein stays stable.”
“Spirit herbs may not be high-grade, but to grow them evenly, you still depend on this kind of terrain.”
Xu Ning listened attentively.
But then Shen Yi trailed off and suddenly smiled again.
“Of course, I only know a little bit about it.”
Xu Ning looked at her helplessly.
“I’m not sure I dare trust little senior sister’s ‘a little bit’ anymore.”
Shen Yi’s eyes curved, as if pleased by the words.
“Then just pretend I know a lot.”
She said it lightly, but Xu Ning didn’t laugh.
What if what this place was hiding wasn’t spiritual qi, but something else?
The thought only flickered through his mind before he suppressed it.
He had only just achieved Qi Introduction, and knew far too little about mountain terrain and earth veins.
To grow suspicious over a faint, barely perceptible stirring would be far too absurd.
After the meal, everyone returned to their own rooms.
Sun Buping still hadn’t shown his face.
Luo Zhao, however, came back from outside once.
He carried a hint of alcohol on him, though not heavily.
Seeing Xu Ning and Shen Yi standing in the corridor, he seemed about to say something, but his gaze shifted between the two of them.
He smiled, cupped his hands in greeting, and turned back into his own room.
Lu Hanyi’s room was on the other side.
She returned very late, her footsteps extremely light as she passed through the corridor.
Xu Ning heard the sound and instinctively looked up.
Lu Hanyi wore a snow-white outer robe, her expression even colder than it had been during the day.
Noticing his gaze, she lifted her eyes.
Across half a corridor, they looked at each other from a distance.
The lamplight swayed slightly in the wind, and then both of them returned to silence.
Shen Yi stood beside Xu Ning, her gaze resting on Lu Hanyi’s retreating figure for a moment.
“What are you looking at her for?”
Xu Ning looked away.
“I just heard the footsteps.”
“Oh.”
Shen Yi hummed in response, sounding less than convinced.
Xu Ning said helplessly, “Little senior sister, my hearing isn’t good enough yet to know who it is without looking.”
“You’ll get there someday.”
Shen Yi tilted her head to look at him, a hint of mischief in her eyes.
“But senior sister Lu really is pretty, and a water-attributed sword cultivator too, all cold and distant. She matches you quite well.”
Xu Ning’s steps faltered.
“Matches well?”
“That’s right.”
Shen Yi said with a grin, “You’re both easy on the eyes.
Standing together, you’d look quite fitting.”
Xu Ning gave her a look, his tone even.
“If little senior sister wants to make jokes, you’d do better to pick someone else.”
Shen Yi’s brow arched slightly.
“What, you don’t like hearing it?”
“That’s not it.”
Xu Ning looked toward the direction of Lu Hanyi’s closed door, his voice gentle.
“It’s just that between Senior Immortal Lu and me, it’s no longer suitable to make jokes.”
The smile on Shen Yi’s face faded a little.
She had only been teasing him offhand.
But after those words fell, the night breeze in the corridor seemed to pause for a moment.
Xu Ning showed no resentment, no avoidance either.
He had simply put that relationship back where it belonged now.
Shen Yi looked at him, then gave a soft huff after a moment.
“Fine.”
“I won’t tease you about her anymore.”
Having said that, Shen Yi seemed to think of something else and turned her face toward him.
“When we get back to the sect, you should first pick a suitable cultivation method.”
Xu Ning nodded.
“I was just about to ask you about that.”
“Ask me.”
Shen Yi immediately perked up.
“I’m very good at picking cultivation methods.”
She said it with such sheer confidence.
Xu Ning thought of how she always claimed to know “a little bit of everything,” and for a moment, he couldn’t tell how much of it was trustworthy.
Shen Yi caught his look, pressed her soft pink lips together, and deliberately put on a hint of displeasure.
“If you don’t believe me, fine.”
“It’s not that I don’t believe you.”
Xu Ning said, “It’s just that I haven’t truly stepped into Qi Refining yet, so I don’t know which path to take.”
“Then take it slow.”
Shen Yi’s voice softened a little.
“Cultivation isn’t just about speed. What you lack most right now isn’t realm.”
Xu Ning was briefly startled.
“Then what is it?”
Shen Yi looked at him, eyes bright with a smile.
“Why, a guide, of course. With good teachers and friends at your side, you can avoid so many detours.”
Xu Ning shook his head with a laugh.
So even immortals could brag about themselves.
“I’ll remember that.”
Shen Yi watched him for a while, then suddenly smiled.
“Then get some rest early.”
Xu Ning nodded.
Shen Yi took two steps, then looked back.
“Don’t go wandering around at night.”
Xu Ning let out a helpless laugh.
“Do I look like the type to go wandering?”
“You do.”
Shen Yi answered quickly.
Xu Ning was left speechless.
With that, their chat came to an end, and each returned to their own room.
The guest room the medicine manor had arranged was small, but neatly kept.
The bed, wooden table, and folding screen were all in ordinary mortal style.
The room wasn’t soundproof.
In the distance, a manor household closed their wooden door, the door hinges letting out a soft creak.
After that, only the faint chirping of insects from the medicine fields remained.
Listening to that sound, Xu Ning suddenly realized how far he was from Green Pond Town.
The freedom he had once wanted was to leave Cold Sword Peak, return to an ordinary mortal town, and keep living the life he knew.
But now, he was a guest elder of Zhaoyue Cliff.
He closed the doors and windows, placed his Storage Pouch by the bedside, and took out the Manor Seal to look at it.
The bronze square seal lay quietly in his palm.
The sensation of spiritual power being stirred from earlier in the day hadn’t returned.
Xu Ning stared at it for a while, then ultimately put it away again.
Perhaps he really was just being paranoid.
Once the loading was done tomorrow, they could head back, and the assessment would be complete.
There had been probing from Luo Zhao and the others along the way, and the awkwardness of traveling with Lu Hanyi, but in the end, nothing had truly turned sour.
Everyone had kept the peace.
For him, that counted as a rare good outcome.
Afterward, he could also ask Shen Yi about the proper paths for techniques and merits.
As for things further down the road, he could only think about them slowly.
Xu Ning tucked the Manor Seal back into his Storage Pouch and pressed his fingers to his brow.
The fatigue from days of travel finally caught up with him, his shoulders and back feeling heavy.
Before long, a servant from the manor brought hot water.
The bath bucket was placed behind the folding screen, and a few medicinal herbs meant to invigorate the blood and relax the sinews floated on the surface.
Steam rose slowly, quickly leaving a layer of dampness along the edges of the screen.
Xu Ning thanked the servant.
When the footsteps faded, he finally removed his outer robe.
Hot water rose past his shoulders.
Settling into the water, the body that had been tense for days finally loosened.
The herbal scent wasn’t strong, like an ordinary formula for relaxing sinews and invigorating blood.
Back in the herb shop, Xu Ning had often brewed similar baths for people with sprains from travel.
The properties were mild and wouldn’t harm the body.
He leaned against the wall of the tub and closed his eyes.
Outside the window, insects chirped in a fine, dense chorus.
The lamplight in the room blurred from the steam.
At this moment, all perception seemed to recede.
He slowly let out a breath.
Hot water covered his shoulders, and the surface rippled in small, faint circles.
Xu Ning kept his eyes closed, listening to the dense chirping outside.
The mind that had been taut for days finally loosened, and for once, he wasn’t thinking about anything.
The lamplight in the room suddenly dimmed by an inch.
Xu Ning didn’t open his eyes, simply assuming the night wind had stirred the wick.
The steam continued to rise.
But the mist had somehow grown heavier, curling around the rim of the tub like a shadow cast by the lamplight.
The water still held its warmth, yet the medicinal herb leaves floating on the surface sank silently, one by one.
Before long, Xu Ning’s breathing turned ragged.
He felt an inexplicable heat, like the finest thread of fire scraping across his skin, burning along his meridians all the way to his chest.
He looked down at his arm.
A faint layer of dampness had risen on his skin.
The spiritual power in his dantian was also drawn into it, suddenly turning extremely restless.
Xu Ning clenched his teeth, trying to suppress the strangeness, but the harder he forced his breath to still, the tighter his chest grew, and his exhaled breath became heavier and rougher.
The lamplight swayed in the mist.
In a daze.
He seemed to hear someone laughing.
A pair of almond-shaped eyes surfaced before him.
Bright, sly, the outer corners tilting slightly upward.
But before that face could fully take shape, it was covered by a cold, pale frost.
Lu Hanyi’s brows and eyes emerged from the mist, still cold and aloof, yet softened by the steam until even her eye corners seemed tinged with a faint flush.
Xu Ning’s breath caught.
The two faces crossed back and forth in his mind.
A radiant smile.
Cold eyes.
Closeness radiating warmth.
Frost seen from afar.
Cold sweat beaded on Xu Ning’s temples.
“No… this isn’t right.”
This wasn’t his own thought.
In the neighboring room.
Shen Yi was lying by the bed flipping through a storybook, a slender calf showing beneath her skirt, her toes swinging idly up and down.
At the base of the wall, a wisp of black mist seeped in silently.
Shen Yi looked up.
The lazy, soft expression on her face vanished in an instant.
Her fingertips tightened, pressing a deep crease into the storybook.
“Demonic qi?”